Understanding, even Deep Understanding, is just the beginning of a #HappilyAutistic and #ProudlyPDA little human…and a wonderfully open, loving #HomeCrazzyHome all your own.
Now we move on to…
Acceptance…
Google:
- the process or fact of being received as adequate, valid, or suitable.
- willingness to tolerate a difficult situation.
Oxford:
- the process or fact of being received as adequate, valid, or suitable.
Cambridge Dictionary:
- general agreement that something is satisfactory or right, or that someone should be included in a group
- the fact of accepting a difficult or unpleasant situation.
And this one from Wikipedia that relates specifically to human psychology:
- a person’s assent to the reality of a situation, recognizing a process or condition (often a negative or uncomfortable situation) without attempting to change it or protest it.
For the purpose of this book, I want to examine two specific components of Acceptance…
- Process or fact of being received as ADEQUATE, VALID, SUITABLE, SATISFACTORY, and RIGHT.
- Tolerate a difficult or unpleasant situation or as Wiki said better…a person’s assent to the reality of a situation, recognizing a process or condition without attempting to change it or protest it.
Before we move into those though, I want to say a bit about Acceptance and Grief.
Often when you are talking about having a special needs child, you hear about grieving. Grieving the normal child you did not have. You may have even read this one:
Welcome to Holland…by Emily Perl Kingsley
I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability – to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It’s like this……
When you’re going to have a baby, it’s like planning a fabulous vacation trip – to Italy. You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It’s all very exciting.
After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, “Welcome to Holland.”
“Holland?!?” you say. “What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy! I’m supposed to be in Italy. All my life I’ve dreamed of going to Italy.”
But there’s been a change in the flight plan. They’ve landed in Holland and there you must stay.
The important thing is that they haven’t taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It’s just a different place.
So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.
It’s just a different place. It’s slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you’ve been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around…. and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills….and Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts.
But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy… and they’re all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life, you will say “Yes, that’s where I was supposed to go. That’s what I had planned.”
And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away… because the loss of that dream is a very very significant loss.
But… if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn’t get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things … about Holland.
While that may seem right…normal…there is a hidden agenda in there. A stumbling block that can completely derail true Acceptance. The idea that…
the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away…
Let me ask you this one…how can you ever embrace your PDA, autistic, or special needs child as ADEQUATE, VALID, SUITABLE, SATISFACTORY, and RIGHT if you believe that the pain and loss of not having a ‘normal’ child will never, ever, ever, ever go away?
The answer is…You Can’t!
I have seen it much too often in the #AutismParent syndrome. To the point that I limit the autism events, groups, and resources that I use. I have repeatedly decried it as…Poor Me, My Life is SOOOOOOO Tough.
First of all…you don’t parent autism. You don’t parent a child with autism. You parent an autistic child. Autism is an inseparable part of your child…a part of their identity. Who they are. You cannot cure their autism and they remain the same. In the end, you cannot accept your child without embracing their autism.
You will never be able to see your autistic child as ADEQUATE, VALID, SUITABLE, SATISFACTORY, and RIGHT as long as you hold on to some imaginary vision of the child you should have had…of pain and loss.
Instead, you will become an embittered #AutismParent attending every training, seminar, or event; buying every book; joining every group; and spending thousands upon thousands upon thousands of $$$/£££/€€€/¥¥¥ trying to make your child ‘normal’.
Worse yet is the horribly high cost of your behavior on your #ActuallyAutistic child. Our little humans are smart. Much smarter than we give them credit for being. They know…they feel…and yes, too often they hear your disappointment, your anger…that pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away.
Is that what you want? Is that what your child…any little human deserves?
As long as you are seflishly (yes…I just called these parents SELFISH…and that is mild compared to what I would like to call them) stuck in your expectations, your grief…then you cannot assent to the reality of a situation, recognizing a process or condition without attempting to change it or protest it.
That is what you are working towards…
Seeing your little human as ADEQUATE, VALID, SUITABLE, SATISFACTORY, and RIGHT without attempting to change her or protest the life that the two of you have been given.
Self-Directed Learning & Neurodiversity 